Lotus and Equifax Dump Consumer Data Project:...

Lotus and Equifax Dump Consumer Data Project: Bowing to privacy concerns, Lotus Development Corp. and Equifax Inc. said they have canceled a product that would have provided personal computer users with information on the shopping habits of 120 million U.S. households. In announcing the cancellation of MarketPlace: Household, the companies insisted that the $695 product included sufficient safeguards to protect privacy. However, the partners couldn’t ignore “the volume and tenor of concerns that were being raised by consumers all over the U.S.,” said Jim Manzi, president of Cambridge, Mass.-based Lotus, a major maker of personal computer software. “We think they did the right thing,” said Marc Rotenberg, Washington director of Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility, an opponent of the software.